Forgotten Ambition
© 2019 Samurai, all rights reserved. This is a Champion short. May contain violence and language. Chapter One: Tarik I walked through the woods, which normally would have been fine except for the fact that these were mountain woods. That meant a nice, steep incline, and even with my superhuman legs, it was no fun. I've never liked big hills. "My calves," I wheezed, clambering across a boulder, "they're not very happy." "Glad to know I have something in common with your calves," Ruby said, and while she wasn't much of a complainer, I could tell she hated the bugs, the heat, and the steepness of the trail. She just wanted to go back to the campsite and maybe swim in the lake. I wanted that too, but we had to keep going. I wouldn't rest until I knew where those smoke signals were coming from - they had been too organized for it to be someone's campfire, and who camped all the way out here when there was a nice campground, a whole darn state park, by the lake? In fact, it wasn't even allowed, though I doubted that would stop most people from doing it. But still, those were definitely smoke signals I saw that morning, and I was curious. Maybe too curious. "Hey, did you bring water by any chance?" Ruby asked. I nodded, fishing a condensation-covered water bottle out of my backpack. I opened it for her, and she accepted it, and I turned my focus back to the trail, back to climbing the mountain, back to- Something very cold splashed onto my neck and back, and I whirled around to see Ruby holding the half-empty water bottle. She smiled, capped it, tossed it in her bag, and bolted up the trail, and you better believe I chased her. She wasn't getting off until I threw her in the lake! Admittedly, that ''had ''cooled me off a bit, and we were both laughing, scaring away any and all wildlife within a ten mile radius. I've known Ruby since she was a baby, and I'm proud to say she inherited my wheezy laugh. And so we wheezed the rest of the way up the mountain, surprisingly not having that much further to go. When we reached the clearing at the top, she took a risk and stopped running, and I trapped her in a bear hug. "That was cold," I said, getting out my own water bottle. "And so..." "Nope!" Laughing, she wriggled out of the hold, and it always amazed me how easily she could do that. She could get out of anything, no matter how iron-like the other person's grip was. "Hey, I was just going to help you cool off," I said innocently, splashing some water at her. "Sure," she said, scowling at me. Before I could reply, something moved in the woods ahead, causing a fairly loud crash among the fallen leaves. We both froze and stared in its direction, kind of like frightened deer (not something I like comparing myself to, at any rate), and the whole forest, the whole mountain, fell into tense silence. "What was that?" Ruby whispered. "It sounded big." I moved in front of her, even though she always insisted she didn't need protecting. "Might be a bear. I can deal with a bear, I think." "Tarik," she said quietly, "there aren't any bears in these woods." She was right, and though part of me wanted to believe it was a coyote or fox or some other creature, I knew it had sounded far too large to be any of those things. That left only one explanation. "Who's out there?" I called. "I'm armed!" By that, I meant I had a stick I'd picked up off the ground just then, but whoever was there didn't know that. A tight silence ensued, much like the one moments ago, and every fragment of my being prepared for trouble. Surely they couldn't have found us all the way out here... Category:Content (Samurai) Category:Stories